A Tour of the Underworld

An exposition, as painful as it is real, of the life of the workers "in a well-known working district on the outskirts of Beirut." Its aim, as the writer says, is "neither condemnation nor judgment — we condemn no one — but to draw the attention of the responsible, and the responsible are all of us," to one of the most prominent of our social problems.

Woman in our country to this day does not "vote." Yet her voice may reach ears and hearts and consciences as the clamor of the "voters" never does. And that is what moved me to answer the request when I was asked for a report on the condition of the workers in a well-known working district on the outskirts of Beirut.

It is a report. And a report carries figures, sketches directions, and is content with that. As for the figures, I gathered them from "inquiries" I made among the workers' families with complete fidelity and with what exactness I could. As for the directions, I shall not go into them; perhaps the figures will suggest something of them.

1 - Housing conditions

Of 206 families gathered in a single parish, only 31 families live in more than one room — 6 of them in three rooms and the rest in two — bearing in mind that 7 families of this latter group number between 8 and 14 persons each. As for the remaining hundred and seventy-five families, each of them lives in a single room.

And of 63 families distributed among three different parishes, 22 families live in more than one room, 8 of these being the property of their occupants.

* These 206 families number 1,062 persons, and the 63 families 461 — that is, an average of 5 and of 7 persons to a family: from which you see that they are broods rich in blessing!.. while families beneath them in "blessing" enjoy spacious houses and vacant rooms.

* The rent of a single room runs between 20 and 25 Lebanese lira a month. They are built of "lin" (concrete block); damp seeps through the best-built of them in winter, and the heat and humidity of summer make of them human "fermenting-vats." He who built them cared nothing for art or beautification, nor for the necessary sanitary precautions, nor for making repairs when the need arises: his one care is what these rooms bring in, and that the rent be collected on time.

* Here is "Jamil," living in an underground room that would not do as a coop for the landlady's hens — three meters long and a meter and a half wide. Its walls are unwhitewashed, and it sees the sun neither at its rising nor at its setting. He pays ten liras a month for it. Visiting him one day, I noticed on the face of his small child (they are four in the coop!) the marks of raised bites, which I learned were the bites of rats. No doubt it vexed the rats that a strange tenant should move in upon them, so they took to attacking them, stealing their vengeful bites from the little child.

* Mr. M. has a building in the district housing 28 families in two rows of rooms — you would take it for a military barracks. The building is without electricity, so the tenants rose up and demanded of Mr. M. light for their rooms, and he refused. They offered him many solutions, among them that they should share in the costs of installing the electricity, or that they should install it at their own expense against a permission from the owner of the property; but he would accept none of it — he turned his back, repeating: Without electricity you came in, and without electricity you will go out. They gave him rough words, and he said of them that they were a crowd without breeding or manners, and with no fear of God in them!

* But what have we to do with such matters now. Let us return to the figures.

63 families sleep on 348 mattresses — that is, an average of 5 mattresses for every seven persons. Bearing in mind that the distribution is not equitable. For you will find families made up of nine members with no more than five mattresses, and others of fourteen persons with only eight mattresses. Eight mattresses laid out on the floor of the room so close that you cannot find a space between them to set your foot.

What, then, can health be in these families, and what can morals be? And what rest can the night laborer taste in a room that is workshop and kitchen and dining table and sleeping place and receiving room? The district abounds in factories, and there is more than one factory in it working night and day. My inquiries among a number of the workers have taught me that they do not usually enjoy more than 3 or 4 hours of sleep against 9 and 10 and 12 hours of work!

2 - Hours of work and wages

I said 9 and 10 and 12 hours, because the hours of work fixed by law find, in reality, no measure but the will of the employer and the need of the workers. Work grows plentiful, and so the employer is "compelled" to lengthen the hours of work. And if it does not please you, go butt the wall if you like — and beyond the wall, the factory gate. For at the gate stands one to take your place before your spot has grown cold!..

And the price of labor falls — it has in fact fallen to where there is no further room for falling — so the worker is compelled to work extra hours. And the extra hours are hours like any others, and no hour has any distinction over another. The clock-hand turns, and the machine turns, and the earth turns the selfsame turning.

— And the labor law, you say, the labor law! What becomes of it, and how does it fare, amid such violations?

The road that leads to chaos is easy, and the door to breaking the law is wide. You can break the law as much as you please and remain within the law. Employ your workers — for instance — for a few months and lay them off for a few days, and the indemnity flies away and your head stays safe!.. Or set your workers a piece-quota of work that makes them work twelve hours with all gratitude. Thus with one stone you will have hit two rabbits — nay, three: you have doubled your profit, secured the worker his wage, and kept the law as well, and everyone is obliged.

And the first to be obliged is the worker. For the eight legal hours, the detestable ones, bring him in no more than two liras or two liras and a half — and, if they "split their belly," then three. Whereas he obtains the five liras if he works twelve hours. And five liras talk. And with five liras there is life, or some part of life, for him who wants life.

— Do not hold this mocking tone against me; I almost forget that this is a report. But criticism is a temperament and an easy matter; in every hand there is a pickaxe for it, and few are they who build.

Let us return to the figures.

3 - Nutrition

Unemployment, and chaos in work, and scanty wages, and living costs that rise and rise: so the earner of the two and three liras — that lucky man — is compelled to buy the uqiyya of meat at seventy, the kilo of brown bread at forty-five, and the squash and string beans and tomatoes and the rest of the vegetables at not less than fifty. How, then, is he to be nourished and live? Say rather that you see him scraping a subsistence and half-living.

Hungry one day, full the next!.. An example: in a school numbering 215 pupils, one of the Red Cross doctors could not count more than thirty on whose faces the signs of adequate nutrition appeared. And curiosity drove me to inquire further into what these children eat in their homes. I found that among the 63 families mentioned, 22 cook with meat once a week, 33 twice, and only eight families more than twice. And I marveled at the popularity of za'tar and oil for breakfast: it seems it opens the mind and quickens the thoughts!

And how many times have I asked one of these little ones: What did you have for supper last night? And he answers me with a certain detachment and a total simplicity: Last night we had no supper — the bread was held up at the bakery; that is what Mama said. Yes, that is what "Mama" says, to put her children off and to cheat her own misery.

— These are facts; I testify before God that they are the truth, and they are only part of the truth. For the Lebanese worker, as we know him, is proud of soul; he is ashamed of his poverty and hides it from your eye with much artifice. Nor is he stingy with himself and his children when his hand can reach: the worth of a thing, for him, is that it be there. He may have no supper for the night, and yet he will insist on appearing content with God's bounty, and on serving you coffee like other people.

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And now: I was asked for a report — is this that I have written a report? I dare not call it a report, nor anything other than a report. It is a few figures, and glimpses, and observations whose aim is neither condemnation nor judgment — we condemn no one — but to draw the attention of the responsible, and the responsible are all of us, and to lead them on to take notice that there is in Lebanon a problem of labor and a distress of workers which we cannot shut our eyes to; for it is our problem, and its distress ought to be our distress.

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